Claws
by penguinfragger
Summary: Terror sweeps over backwater colony LV398 when Xenomorphs creap into the peaceful valley. Rated T for future violence and gore.


Disclaimer: I don't own Aliens vs. Predator, just the events featured in my story. Blah.

A/N: I don't really know where I'm going with this yet, it came about as I was playing AVP2 on my computer. I may thrown in a Pred or two somewhere along the way, but I never saw the Predator movies so in advance: please excuse any sloppy mistakes I may make on them. Bugs on the other hand are right down my lane :-P

Anyway, on with the fic.

Somewhere on ground level, a door hissed open. A couple cones of light shone through, there were whispers, and then a man stepped through the doorframe, shotgun held gingerly in front of him, flashlight sweeping across the corridor. Three more men entered, and sealed the door behind them. Their flashlights were the only source of illumination in the ambient darkness. The air was chill and intensely dark, to the point where they could see their breath go up in ragged little clouds.

"Team to admin, we're inside C-Block. Power is down. No sign of any Xenomorphs yet."

The man's voice echoed in the hollow building.

"Roger that team, proceed to command and restore power. Open storm shutters and activate scanning systems. Perform a full scan of the building, with all sublevels and canalizations. If a bug made it this far we have to find the bastard before he gets away again."

The team moved stealthily down the corridor, alert to any sign of sound or movement, until they came to a stairwell.

"This leads to level two" One of the men said.

"That's the command level" Said another.

"Yep…move along guys."

The group ascended the stairs, and halted at the top, sweeping the place with their motion detectors. No sign of movement within the thirty meter radius of the captors.

"Command central is just down this corridor to the right. Let's go"

They walked with a bit more determination down the deserted hallway, all the while keeping their eyes open for any sign of a struggle. They knew what to look for, but were hoping not to find anything. They finally arrived before a door marked "C-Block – Central Command". The leader triggered the lock and the door hissed open. The room inside was as dark as all the rest, the storm shutters were down, sheets of paper littered the place, and there was an unbelievable jumble of mess all over the floor. They sealed the door behind themselves and breathed out.

"Josh, Kurt, get the power back online."

The two men hurried out of sight over to the far end of the room and began rummaging with panels on the wall. Moments later there was a low humming sound and the lights came slowly flickering back on. Everyone let out a sigh of relief. As Kurt opened the storm shutters, Martin, the leader of the small team, and James powered up the scanning device.

"Launching full scan. Should take about five minutes."

A faint blip from Josh's motion tracker caught their attention.

"What was that?" asked Mart.

Dunno, it seemed to be coming from down the hallway. Bout twenty-ish meters I'd say. But it was too small to be a bug."

"I'm raising administration anyway."

Martin grabbed his communications unit and raised the colony's administration, back down in the valley.

"Team to admin, we've reached command and restored power to C-Block. The place is absolutely deserted, but there are no signs of a struggle whatsoever. The command center is ransacked though, but I thought bugs didn't usually do make such clean jobs. However we just picked up a ghost signal on one of our two motion trackers. Do you want us to investigate?"

"Well what did the scan conclude?"

"Scan is in progress sir, we don't have the results yet."

"Then wait goddamnit and if a Xenomorph presence is confirmed, dig in and wait for us to send you the big guns. If there's no bug, just go check it out."

"Copy that. Over and out."

The four men loitered around for a bit, somewhat disturbed by the ghost signal. The backwater colony motion trackers were notorious for confusing a beetle with a rhinoceros, but it was still unsettling. The marines got all the good stuff. Their trackers could pick up a bat farting thirty meters away. Anyway they shouldn't be getting on their toes for this affair. Communications crapped out all the time, and it had become routine on this hellhole.

The beeping noise from the scanning device pulled Martin from his reverie. He moved over to the screen and inspected the results. No Xenomorphs had been detected within the base or compound, however a certain portion of the sublevels and the entire north wing of the compound had proved un-scannable. Goddamnit! Wasn't there anything that worked correctly in this pile of junk colony!

blip…blip… the motion tracker came to life again. Josh held it up worriedly.

"Fifteen meters away, headed straight to where we are."

Martin hurried over to the door and tried to see through the view port, but his field of vision was too tight to see much more than three meters down either way.

"Aren't you going to call command?" Asked James.

"If it's a bug headed our way we won't have time. Come on, we're gonna check this signal out. If everything's cool, we'll call command and then get out asses out of here."

He triggered the door and peeped out into the corridor. Nothing in sight.

"The signal is slightly removed to the left, nine meters" Muttered Josh.

The four of them steeped cautiously out of the command room, weapons held ready. There was still nothing in sight. Yet they felt they were being watched by someone or something.

"Five meters…four…three"

"Josh…"

"I'm reading the counter man…two meters."

The feeling of being observed brusquely faded. In stead they jumped as a loud thumping noise came from the wall on their left, along with a muffled yell! Martin sighed and came closer to the wall. How the hell did someone get inside there? He pressed his ear against the wall and, by listening intently, was able to discern the words the man on the other side was yelling at him.

"Turn the power off! Turn it off! I'm in the cooling vents, I'm freezing to death! Turn the power off!"

"What's…" Began Kurt.

"There's someone in the cooling system. Turn the power off and get a torch, we're gonna burn a hole through."

"But…"

"Just do it man, he's gonna freeze to death otherwise!"

With a shrug, Kurt went jogging back into the command room, and moments later the faint humming to which they had become accustomed stopped, and the lights died out again. Apart from the thumping on the other side of the wall, an eerie silence filled the dark corridor. Something was watching them again, they all knew it. James could have sworn he saw something oblong gleam at the edge of his field of vision, just a bit too far to be sure…

Kurt returned a second later with two torches, tossed one to Martin, and together they began burning their way through the weaker parts of the wall. It took them some time, but they finally were able to tear a way big enough for a man to pass through. Out crawled a battered and shivering man, who slumped on the ground moaning and cradling his left arm. As Kurt rushed back into the command room and turned the power back on, Martin and Josh lifted up the wounded man into a sitting position, talking to him to keep him conscious, trying to warm him with their jackets. He had had a narrow escape; A few more minutes and he would have been a goner…

James scrutinized the corridor for a few seconds, but saw no trace of whatever he had imagined only moments before. Kurt returned, and with a shrug, James helped the others bring the survivor back into the command room and sealed the door behind them. Martin raised colony administration once again.

"Team to admin, we have scanned the base and have come up with nothing. However the sublevels and north wing were not scanned, either for cause of interference or defective equipment. We just rescued one man from the cooling systems. He appeared to be hiding in there when we turned the power on, and nearly froze to death."

"Copy that team. Your news doesn't seem overly inviting. Do you have any proof of Xenomorph presence?"

"No, there's nothing that could really attest they made it this far, but I must admit I have a very bad feeling about this place."

"Damnit…"

Martin knew why the administrator swore. Their situation was precarious, yet without solid proof of an imminent threat, they didn't have enough to call down the colonial marines.

"Listen, get back to the colony right away, we'll decide what to do once you're here. Leave a message to all occupants of C-Block to rejoin the mains base immediately. In the meantime we're putting the entire colony on yellow alert status."

"Copy that admin. Over and out."

Martin put away his com and called out to his team.

"All right guys, we're getting out of here. Let's restore the automatic defense grid, along with permanent scans of the interior of the building, just to be sure."

Then turning to their new survivor he asked.

"Will you be able to walk?"

The man, who was beginning to warm up again with the help of Josh and Kurt, nodded with a weak smile and got to his feet. The five of them went out of the control room, and walked at as brisk a pace as they could down the corridor. They reached the stairs and descended them two at a time, gathered at the bottom and scanned the place with the trackers. Still nothing. They jogged their way to the main exit and triggered the door. It hissed open and they were blasted with buffeting winds and the musty smell of LV-398's atmosphere. The storm must have picked up while they were inside. Keeping the survivor between them, the group began making their way down the mountainside into the valley, where the colony lay. Far behind, something scampered out of the open doors of C-Block and went diving into the bushes.


End file.
